5915 replies to this topic

[Nparker]

...If Helps loses, expect no more future bike lanes and perhaps even the extremely expensive scrapping of our existing ones to be replaced with parking or more travel lanes as ideology is put ahead of proven transport engineering.

It seems highly unlikely that any new civic government is going to spend money to tear out and replace the existing bike lanes. Suggesting that is blatant fear-mongering on the part of a very specific demographic. Studying the impact of the existing bike lanes before spending millions on expanding the network seems prudent to me.

[FogPub]

It's incredibly easy to read between the lines, or just be aware of the candidates opinions on various matters stated elsewhere.  The people running against Helps are trying to cash in on the "bikelash".  If Helps loses, expect no more future bike lanes and perhaps even the extremely expensive scrapping of our existing ones to be replaced with parking or more travel lanes as ideology is put ahead of proven transport engineering.

"Proven transport engineering"?

 

It seems odd that transport engineering would support or even suggest a solution - in this case, the bike lanes - that manages to make all four common means of transport* less efficient than they were before!

* - bus, bike, foot, auto

 

I'd like to think transport engineering has transport efficiency as one of its main goals, with safety being the other, if only out of a desire to save energy.

[rjag]

It's incredibly easy to read between the lines, or just be aware of the candidates opinions on various matters stated elsewhere.  The people running against Helps are trying to cash in on the "bikelash".  If Helps loses, expect no more future bike lanes and perhaps even the extremely expensive scrapping of our existing ones to be replaced with parking or more travel lanes as ideology is put ahead of proven transport engineering.

 

Thats fear mongering. Everybody keeps saying that Helps has only 1 vote on the council and its not a dictatorship. If anything I would hope that a more reasoned approach to this takes place and not her Bull-in-a-china-shop and apologize later style of decision making.

 

Its ideology thats got us in this pickle, proven transport engineering would have meant a more technical analysis approach instead of the current approach. All you have to do is look at the reaction from the bike lobby when the CoV professionals came out and said Vancouver St not Cook....Thats ideology at play...Lisa's response when she gets pushback from internal staff is to replace them with ones that sing from the same song book...thats ideology at work

[Mystic-Pizza]

I like regular bike lanes. They have been around in Victoria for years, and years and have always functioned perfectly fine. And the good thing is that entire lanes for vehicle traffic never had to be taken out, and no parking spaces were lost.

 

No elected mayor will remove the current ones that Helps built, but one guy running is going to put a stop to the one planned for Wharf St. If elected he is simply going to put a full stop to the entire thing and re-look at it all and figure out how to do it properly.  Perhaps 10 or 20 years from now when all is forgotten a mayor will have them Jack Hammered out and finally get vehicle traffic flow moving again in the down town core.

[Victoria Watcher]

There will be two non-binding questions on the election ballot, including whether three council candidate nominees should also be elected to the Capital Regional District Board,including Marg Gardiner, Ben Isitt and Jeremy Loveday.

 

https://www.vicnews....cipal-election/

 

 

 

?????

 

 

 

also 3 of the 40 candidates live on battery st. is that odd?

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 15 September 2018 - 04:25 PM.

[Nparker]

Can you write in someone else's name as CRD board member?

[Stephen Andrew]

Owns L.A. Limo and married to a Metchosin councilor. Have we ever had someone on council live as far away as Metchosin?Is there a conflict of interest when discussing regional issues if you are married to a councilor in another jurisdiction?

So this race is just gonna be incumbents versus Together Vic versus New Council?

Only candidate with MAYBE a shot without a slate is Gardner? If she picks up momentum you just know somebody is gonna bring up her C-Fax interview comments on indigenous people. Incumbents wont let her get that close.

That Martay dude ran provincially in one of the victoria ridings in 2017. I remember he was living in a van or something and had a plan for B.C. to have its own BitCoin lol

Riga Godron and Stephen Andrew both ran for mayor in 2014 and now council in 2018. She hated him and you would think he grew to hate her back for all the crap he had to deal with from her. Will sparks fly again this election?

For clarification - Riga’s behaviour in one All Candidate meeting was inappropriate to the point every time I tried to talk she interrupted and crackled her bottle in the microphone. More about Riga in a moment.

Of the other candidates sitting at the table none, not one spoke up and asked for some respect. All of the present council was there. Not one word. That was more dispectful than anything and I remember that to this day.

Back to Riga - shortly after that night she took several days off the campaign. The next we spoke was at an event at UVic. Riga cam up to me and apologized for her behaviour. I accepted he apology. I am boring going to go into the full conversation because that’s between Riga and myself. I asked her if she had anything against me and she said no, and apologized again. I never for once “hated” Riga or have any ill will to her. Hope that sets THAT straight 😀

[Stephen Andrew]

A meaningless but worrying statement.

Hi. What’s worrrying about it.

Pose questions and I wu get you some answers

[rmpeers]

One can't help question the timing of this announcement.

How about an audit of the Elsner affair, since the mayor is suddenly exploring this concept of fiscal accountability?

Edited by rmpeers, 15 September 2018 - 05:23 PM.

[rmpeers]

What's so scary about this?

"a transportation plan that recognizes all forms of mobility, and that automobiles are still a fundamental form of transportation of both goods and people."

The words "recognize all" would likely cause the mayor and councillor Isitt to collapse with laughter at the crazy notion of trying to work for all your constituents.

[rmpeers]

Fort St really seems just fine.... Yeah construction bad. Victoria we hate everything. But seriously, there was like a few parking spots lost?

I suppose the mentality of the "Poor Fort St" and John A, are why I cannot take Victoria local politics too seriously... This just speaks to how great our lives are on the whole.

Fort street is great, apart from the fact that the entire design was so badly bungled that the lanes feel way too narrow even in a small car. Considering all the money they blew, you'd think they could have budgeted for a tape measure. And, no, this doesn't make me anti-bike lane and it has nothing to do with John A Mcdonald, just plain ol' bad planning, bad design and bad budgeting.

[Stephen Andrew]

I'd say the statement is worrying in the sense that, evidently, the vast majority of CRD residents/most CoV residents drive to work while the overwhelming majority of the infrastructure is set up for automobiles. But it position automobile users as being marginalized and displaced wholesale by bike lanes (since no one really feels antagonized by walking or buses). So to me it goes beyond just implying that investments need to be to alleviate congestion, but that car use should receive more priority.

Speaking for myself, but I will get a statement from other NewCouncil.ca candidates, your assumptions are not in keeping with my thoughts on the NewCouncil.ca statement.

I support cycling infrastructure and I wsn to see it continue. In fact, I can say here and now as a Councillor I would votes to continue expansion. The question becomes would I suportntje current method of imposing it rather than a collaborative plan that takes the needs and advice of neighbourhoods into account.

Budgets need to be solid, we need proper consultation (I pointed out before the Mayor’s February 2017 apology to Fort Street merchants for that botched consultation process) and I’d like to see that we ensure any plan connects regionally.

As for the “cars considered” comment... I definitely want to see a balance of ALL transportation modes. That means parking needs to be considered, pedestrians, bikes, cars, busses and anything else that comes along.

If you have any questions email me through my website www.stephenandrew.ca


And leaving you with a final thought... I see some
people are trying to paint myself and others running on the NewCouncil.ca team as “scary”.

I’m not. And the only time I was deliberately scary was when I played the Pantomime Villain for the past two years at the McPherson Playhouse. I also wrote the script. Our biggest laughs came from jokes about the cost of the bridge, bike lane and other municipal issues. They got it because the handling of both was inept. It indicated to me, people were resigned to the fact ithey couldn’t do anything but laugh. If you’re looking for something scary... I’d take a look at the millions wasted. More of that kind of nonsense should make everyone quake in their boots. 😉

[Casual Kev]

Hi. What’s worrrying about it.

Pose questions and I wu get you some answers

 

To lay it straight will bike lane expansion be a priority among the New Council slate, or at least your own? Yeah blah blah it's a balancing act between different modes of transportation, but for instance - would you/New Council throw the remaining components of Biketoria into the backburner or otherwise downscale it?

[Stephen Andrew]

It's incredibly easy to read between the lines, or just be aware of the candidates opinions on various matters stated elsewhere. The people running against Helps are trying to cash in on the "bikelash". If Helps loses, expect no more future bike lanes and perhaps even the extremely expensive scrapping of our existing ones to be replaced with parking or more travel lanes as ideology is put ahead of proven transport engineering.

What a blatantly absurd statement. Smacks of fear-mongering.

As Councillor I will not support any of the negative suggestions you make here.

Yes, there have to be “retrofitting” of accessibility engineering (audio signals for the blind, for example), but o think that’s it.

I highly doubt “any” council is going to come along and rip everything out. Ridiculous. So, let’s shut that down now, Baro.

Again, if you hbe reasonable questions, just ask. I have contact forms on my site. 😉

[kxl]

New Council have put up large election signs for the candidates on the NE corner of Burnside Rd E and Dupplin Rd, which is in Saanich but visible all the way from Victoria

Edited by kxl, 15 September 2018 - 05:50 PM.

[Nparker]

...this doesn't make me anti-bike lane and it has nothing to do with John A Mcdonald, just plain ol' bad planning, bad design and bad budgeting.

If you don't experience orgasmic joy over the Fort Street bike lane design you:

- hate the earth
- want to see future generations struggle to survive in a water-logged, smog-filled, polluted cesspool of a planet

- have no understanding or concern for the historical wrong-doings shown to indigenous people

- are a racist

I think that pretty much covers it.

[Nparker]

To lay it straight will bike lane expansion be a priority among the New Council slate...

I suppose that depends on what other priorities the CoV has - like maintaining the existing infrastructure. You know things such as the water lines that come into our homes and the sewage and storm water systems that keeps diseases like cholera from taking hold. 

[Victoria Watcher]

New Council have put up large election signs for the candidates on the NE corner of Burnside Rd E and Dupplin Rd, which is in Saanich but visible all the way from Victoria

 

not even close, the border to saanich is 3 blocks north.

 

https://www.google.c...!7i13312!8i6656

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 15 September 2018 - 05:58 PM.

[Casual Kev]

I suppose that depends on what other priorities the CoV has - like maintaining the existing infrastructure. You know things such as the water lines that come into our homes and the sewage and storm water systems that keeps diseases like cholera from taking hold. 

 

 

I think it's fair to say that maintaining infrastructure is one of the core jobs of a municipality... not a lot of people campaign on keeping water mains and power lines up to date unless they fall into serious disrepair. Besides, laying out a bike lane evidently doesn't prevent you from doing other things outside of budgetary/labor constraints. 

[Nparker]

I think it's fair to say that maintaining infrastructure is one of the core jobs of a municipality... not a lot of people campaign on keeping water mains and power lines up to date unless they fall into serious disrepair... 

Prior to October 20^th, is anyone on the existing council willing to give a concrete answer as to how the CoV's unfunded infrastructure costs will be addressed ? 

...An increasing local government ‘infrastructure deficit’ means that there will be even more competition for available funding. Simply put, this means the cost to renew or replace aging infrastructure exceeds taxpayer ability to pay the cost. The unfunded liability is increasing year after year...

https://www.assetman...-Jan_2011-1.pdf

I'd certainly like to see someone give an update on the following.

...the city’s estimated $500-million infrastructure deficit will be known by May [2012]...Every year, revenue from a 1.5 per cent property tax hike is transferred to the infrastructure reserves. The reserve funds, however, aren’t keeping up to the need...In total, $143 million worth of capital costs have been identified as “unfunded” in the $890-million plan...

https://www.vicnews....-than-expected/